I had the same issue at 86K miles. Had a friend look at it who is a dodge mechanic. He found that the cause of my rear pinion seal leaking was the main pinion gear broke into piece's and destroyed the whole rear end. When doing this job keep an eye out for shards of metal.

 

Surely you would have noticed driveability issue's or certainly heard noises back there. i find it hard to believe you didn't realize or notice anything if your pinion face was all busted up? I suppose if one or two teeth were broken, you wouldn't, but you make it sound like there was nothing left to use...lol
Also, do you have oem LSD because the clutchpack retaining clips are known to fail which break off and can get jammed in your pinion gears which will break them off. I would guess that may have been your issue and the piion teeth were aftermath.
However, DIRTY gear oil and yes, busted up internals cause seal leakage, but most of the time its due from dirty oil!

 

So Rich..........what all parts are needed for this?

 

The only part you need to buy is the seal. That's it. I suppose you could put some rtv sealant around the outer edge of the metal housing where it fits firmly in, but the seal is the only part needed. You'll need some basic tools though to get the driveshaft unbolted and a large enough socket to fit over the pinion nut. Not sure what the size of that is exactly? 17mm?
Driveshaft needs to be taken off at the back u-joint. i think those are 9/16"ish size. the driveshaft will pull out of the transmission(just becareful not to drop it and nick the surface up. Also, wipe the output seal on the tranny with an oil soaked rag before you put the driveshaft back in to clean the gunk up.
When you take the pinion nut off(deepwell socket), once it loosens be sure to count your turns. The driveshaft bolting housing needs to come off and may need to be easily pried. There is a washer that is behind the pinion nut, don't lose it. You should use some loctite on the pinion nut when it goes back on.
The seal is gonna need to be pried out. it may be easy or it may be a pain depending on your tools and technique. Take a look at how the old seal is layed in there before you go prying it out so you know whether or not your new seal is correctly seated. Take reference pics if needed as it may help. The new seal should go in as straight as possible to start off with. Either a block of wood or some sort of non abusive tool that you can make work. Once it's initially seated, you can walk around the edges with a mallet and work ayour way around the dges to seat it inplace.
You'll probably have some diff fluid spilling out as the level is right at the seal height. maybe you want to just pull the cover and drain it for a fresh fill at the same time?
Again, the pinion nut gets tightened down to the same number of turns it took to take it off and then just 1hr incriment turn after that at most! Anything slightly past is what you want. So if the mark is at 12'0'clock, go to no further than 1'o'clock. In the middle would be perfect. If it's very hard to turn, just stop at your mark and you will be fine. The bearings wear and depending how much wear you have will determine how easily it will turn past your count, but you can easily force it and crush the collar in too much. i can't stress it enough to count your turns. Mark your socket with a black market or something. Wrap a piece of tape and mark the tape. Put a scrath in the end of the nut pointing to the sky.

i dont know the seal part number. Hopefully another member can jump in and provide that info?

 

If i am not mistaken, isnt the pinion nut a one time use (TTY) nut and must be replaced after torqued once?

 

I think its the crush collar that is a one time use weed.

 

I called the dealer out of curiosity....Quoted me $275. What a joke.

 

THX for the clarification. I knew it was something

 

Yeah, the nut can be used over and over and over again. Crush collar is the deal that can only be torqued once.
Bolts that are one time used such as all of Fords head bolts is because they can stretch. Nuts don't stretch...well, lets keep it clean shall we...lmfao

 

Did you just say that nuts don't stretch? LMAO!! HAHAHA! Damn....I needed that!